Royal Sea Bathing Hospital: from WWII in South Hill Park to Scrubs Glorious Scrubs on VE Day 2020

Screenprinted pillow from 'Loose Parts' by Jane Glennie (2016)

Royal Sea Bathing Hospital, Margate today (now apartments)

Loose Parts and the Engage with Art Festival - South Hill Park, Bracknell. July 2016

​In 2016 I made an installation for South Hill Park Arts Centre in Bracknell commemorating it's history during the Second World War - the Mansion house became the evacuated home of the Royal Sea Bathing Hospital of Margate in Kent. 

'Loose parts' was a set of screenprinted pillows that were laid out on grass beds on the lawn in front of the South Hill Park terrace during the Engage with Art Festival (2-3 July 2016). Patients of the Royal Sea Bathing Hospital, including very many children, were suffering from surgical tuberculosis. Treatment involved being outdoors day and night, those with a diseased spine restricted to a plaster bed, or those with infected joints with splinted limbs. At a time that was pre-antibiotic treatments, if the disease abated the best possible outcome was an immobile back or limb - forever seized up into the least worst position.  The outdoor installation of 'beds' and pillows also celebrated that children in this country are largely now free of this disease: with healthy limbs and free to play without limitation.

​During its stay at South Hill Park, the hospital also cared for many injured Servicemen - who we remember on VE Day on Friday.

Servicemen, South Hill Park, WWII

Since the beginning of April I have been making up scrubs for Scrubs Glorious Scrubs - a fantastic collective of volunteers who are making non-surgical scrubs, hats and scrubs bags for the NHS during the current disease crisis.

In what feels like a lovely twist to the tale of my artwork - I have now converted the remaining pillows into scrubs bags which will be distributed to be used in GP surgeries and other healthcare settings around Bracknell to help with the Covid-19 battle.